Classmates of Drexel student Maye Kimball were taken aback by her most recent post on LinkedIn, announcing her new position as a Project Manager at defense contractor Lockheed Martin. Throughout her highschool and early college years, Kimball had always insisted that she would be part of the team that would one day find a cure for cancer, as she had lost two of her grandparents to the disease. This sudden pivot from developing life saving medicine in memory of her deceased loved ones to assisting in the indiscriminate bombing of the global south, has left those who know her in shock.
“Maye was a very bright student, and was very passionate about advancing medicine” one classmate said, “She never struck me as someone who would aid in the loss of human life.” Kimball initially started at Drexel as a biology major, but switched to business in her sophomore year, so she could better pursue a career in the defense industry. Sources close to Kimball cite her attendance of a Drexel ROTC sponsored viewing of Top Gun: Maverick, as the catalyst for her change in career.
“I saw the way Tom Cruise flew that plane in defense of our beautiful country,” said Kimball, “and I knew that defending our nation was more important than any cure for cancer I could find. Our boys on the frontlines need the best weapons they can get to take out those terrorists.” Former roommate of Kimball, Raul Chungus, remembers her purchasing a large American flag and several government war bonds shortly after viewing the film.
“She came back a changed woman,” Chungus recalls, “She started watching documentaries on Operation: Iraqi Freedom and reading books by Henry Kissinger.” When Chungus asked Kimball about American war crimes in the Middle East following 9/11, Kimball accused him of being a “traitor” and “hating freedom.”
We wish Kimball well in her new career.